


One When Parted

by orphan_account



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Not Really Character Death, Obi-Wan Kenobi Dies, Post-Episode: s02e21-22 Twilight of the Apprentice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-21
Updated: 2019-06-21
Packaged: 2020-05-16 03:46:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19309981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Obi-Wan dies, and Cody can't forgive his husband for leaving him and not coming back.





	One When Parted

**Author's Note:**

> This fix does have a little background: it's part of a small idea I had with @skywalking-across-the-galaxy where Cody was Force sensitive and had a lightsaber, and he and Obi are involved with the Rebellion after Order 66 - and they're married, too, of course. The idea here is that Obi stays behind on Malachor instead of Ahsoka. None of that is super relevant though.
> 
> Obviously some of the ideas are my friend's, I just wanted to write this scene.
> 
> Leave a comment?

Cody was waiting beside Rex, worry twisting tight in his stomach. The Force felt warning, to him, but he couldn't think that it meant Obi was gone. Obi-Wan always came back, Cody had come to rely on that, at least. And Obi-Wan had told him he'd come back this time. Not that Cody believed in reassuring promises, but Cody knew that very often his Obi-Wan strove to  _ keep _ his promises, these days. It wasn't proud of Cody to recognize that Obi-Wan always tried to come back to him.

The Ghost Crew's ship set down in the hangar, looking - as usual - a bit worse for the wear, and Cody felt Rex tense up beside him, saw Syndulla fold her hands in front of her. The ship's ramp lowered, and first to step into the fading sunlight was Kanan, who looked as if the whole world was weighing on his shoulders. Cody could sense grief, loss, exhaustion, and he knew someone didn't come home. He'd grown so familiar with that feeling in the Force, but it had been a long time since it had frightened him so viscerally.

There was Ezra, then, and Cody knew he and Rex were both equally poised for pain - Rex didn't need the Force to read the looks on Kanan and Ezra's faces, and for a moment Cody knew they both had the same thought and couldn't forgive themselves for it:  _ please not my cyare. _ Cody would never wish Ahsoka's loss on Rex, nor would Rex wish Obi's loss on Cody, but for a long moment they almost did.

Then Ahsoka stepped out of the  _ Twilight, _ and Cody could sense Rex's relief like it was a tangible thing, even as his own world ground to a miserable, cold halt. Ahsoka had been crying, clearly, and then her eyes sought out Cody and in the brief second they looked at each other, any remaining doubts Cody may have had were answered. Obi-Wan didn't come back, and Cody could almost hear the apology that Ahsoka was thinking, that all three of them would try to offer him.

Cody had no use for their apologies, did not want to hear them, so he turned quickly and shoved past someone he didn't know, so he could go back to their rooms and be safe from platitudes and explanations and all the banthashit everyone had to offer when people died. Rex, as always, had the sense to let him go - sometimes Cody thought Rex could sense his emotions as clearly as Cody could sense his, although that was, of course, impossible. Ahsoka, though, well-meaning and the one person he didn't want to talk to now - she spoke up in that newly-measured, Jedi-infuriating tone she'd picked up in the past years.

"Cody," she said, soft but firm, and it was funny how easily it stopped Cody in his tracks, despite how he told himself he didn't want to hear. And he didn’t, he didn’t- But if there was anything left to be salvaged out of this mess, anything good here at all, Ahsoka would tell him. He didn’t turn back to look at her, settled his hand on his lightsaber (that he’d made on his own, with Obi-Wan’s patient instruction) and was carefully still. Ahsoka sounded regretful, weary. “He wanted to tell you -  _ Mhi solus dar’tome, _ he said,” she told him. Her pronunciation had gotten better, lately, so the Mando’a words were smooth and final.  _ We are one when parted,  _ that was what the phrase meant. They’d promised it, when they got married, him and his Jedi, and it had always been true before - somehow or other, Obi-Wan had always come back. Cody didn’t have much else, but he had that, these days.

For a moment, Cody hated him so much he wanted to scream, and the Force felt ashy and hollow. How could Obi-Wan possibly do that to him, promise him they were together when they were apart, as if that made it true? Grief and an empty promise were piss-poor excuses for Obi-Wan  _ being there, _ and Obi had the audacity to promise  _ I’m here _ when he had failed to come home, when he was leaving Cody alone. Cody wished Ahsoka hadn’t told him, he wished Obi-Wan had at least had the decency to die without all the dramatics, without a promise he couldn’t keep, as if Obi-Wan hadn’t told enough half-truths in his life.

Cody said none of that, although he knew that everyone standing around could feel his fury and emptiness - gods, he’d thought he’d gotten used to the emptiness - like he could feel their pain. He just made his hands into fists and strode away, to his room - to  _ their _ room.

It was small and neat and as soon as Cody walked in he could smell the several little potted flowers Obi-Wan kept there, and there were the two pillows on the narrow bed and Obi-Wan’s books neatly stacked on their desk and a half-full mug of tea that neither of them had bothered to clean up before Obi left. Everything left behind as if Obi-Wan meant to come back, like Cody himself - wasn’t that always the way with him? He always kept Cody waiting, the damned idiot, and Cody always let him take his time, always let him do what he needed to do, and here he was again and Obi-Wan was gone. Not coming back, this time, and leaving Cody waiting for…

For nothing. Because however hopeful a promise sounded,  _ one when parted, _ Cody had lost enough people to know it was banthashit. Death was death, and people died, and it just hollowed you out more and more until there wasn’t much left to speak of. Cody sat down on the edge of their bed and braced his feet against the floor and stared at the gods-damned mug of tea. There didn’t feel like there was anything else to do, really; he wanted to hold onto the anger, but the Force was echoing and dark and empty, and so was Cody. He had so little left to lose and so little he’d felt was  _ his, _ and stable, and steady - what was he supposed to do when Obi-Wan was  _ gone? _

He wasn’t entirely sure how long he sat there; at some point he had the sense to get up, take a shower, and dump the last of Obi-Wan’s tea down the sink. For some reason, that made him feel sick and awful and exhausted, and his throat closed off and a few hot tears escaped his eyes. He sat down again and buried his face in his hands, and for a moment he felt the vast weight of loneliness settling like fallen stone on his chest until it was just him and the beat of his heart and the horrible whispering of the Force, the Dark coiling snake-smooth and venomous around him and constricting. Cody couldn’t be alone, he couldn’t, it was too much after everything.

How could Obi-Wan  _ dare _ promise him he’d be there?

Eventually, Cody picked himself off the ‘fresher floor, picked up Obi-Wan’s mug, and went back into their little room. He tugged off his boots, one at a time, laboriously pried off pieces of armor and changed into the softest clothes he had, pulling a soft blue sweater out of their shared storage closet - it had always been too big for Obi-Wan, had apparently been an accidental purchase that his Jedi had never returned because he liked the comfort. Cody put it on, to feel the softness, and started to go to bed. He didn’t know what else to do but sleep, he couldn’t talk to anyone.

Before he did, though, something possessed him to pick up Obi-Wan’s abandoned mug (red-brown pottery, purchased on Alderaan and kept since) and fling it at the wall. It smashed into the painted duracrete and shattered apart, the shards flying everywhere and breaking the stems of some of Obi-Wan’s flowers. Cody stared at the pieces, for a minute, and the injured plants, then slumped and got into bed. Pulled the covers up, curled up, pressed his face into Obi-Wan’s pillow until he could almost imagine Obi-Wan was right there, safe and close.

Except the Force was still empty and black.

He would have liked to have been able to say he was responsible, that week, or even that month. The actual truth of the matter was that he didn’t leave his room for three days, and only left it for meals for the next couple weeks. Nobody said much to him, and he wanted it that way - the first time he ventured into a common area, someone tried to speak to him, and he dusted off the old glare that used to send shinies scampering out of his way like a bunch of flies on a bantha carcass. It still worked. Even Rex didn’t bother him, although not because he was afraid - Rex simply knew better.

It was Rex, however, who showed up after two weeks of Cody exchanging no more than a few words with anyone, and knocked on the door with his foot while balancing a heaping tray of food and three bottles of whiskey. Cody sensed it was him, opened his door, and stared a bit dubiously at Rex and his offerings.

“What the hells is this?” he asked.

“Dinner, and then once you’ve got some food in you, alcohol,” Rex said, matter-of-factly, which Cody could have figured out on his own. “Sit, let’s eat. You look like shit.”

“Damn, aren’t you observant,” Cody muttered, but he sat, and Rex sat, and Rex shoved most of the food at him and selected a suspect sandwich for himself.  Cody should’ve been eating more, Obi-Wan would have scolded him. Rex still would if Cody didn’t cooperate and eat, so Cody made himself swallow down at least half of what Rex brought before he reached for the whiskey. Rex didn’t stop him, and in fact didn’t say anything, just poured a glass of whiskey for himself. Cody didn’t want to talk, so he didn’t, and Rex didn’t say anything aside from warning him that he wouldn’t be allowed to drink too much.

Cody had never been one to escape his problems with alcohol, like so many  _ vode _ had done, but there had been times before he’d considered it. But he’d always had too many people he had to protect, to be impairing himself like that. Now, admittedly, it didn’t sound like a bad idea.

Probably why Rex was sticking around.

They would talk, eventually, about the loss, and how Cody couldn’t bring himself to say a remembrance for Obi-Wan. He tried, whenever he said his list of names, but it never came out. He always felt too angry, too confused.  _ We are one when parted. _ It was such a shit goodbye. Cody  _ never _ felt like Obi-Wan was there because being one with Obi-Wan just meant that now it felt as if he were missing part of himself. Cody couldn’t quite admit it to Rex, but he didn’t know what the point of anything was, anymore. For as long as he could remember, he’d been working towards a future that, if vague, had been an anchor point. And if he had been unsure what he wanted  _ with  _ Obi-Wan, someday, he didn’t even know how to begin thinking about a future alone. Despite the fact that Cody never told him, he thought Rex knew. Rex always seemed to know.

Cody got back to training, some. The Rebellion needed him, even if he couldn’t find much energy to give to the cause - as much as he hated the Empire, loved his  _ aliit, _ he had joined the Rebellion more for Obi-Wan than because he had personally wanted to. He was too tired of fighting and war to really want to be there, and it was hard to find it in him to fight for a future that he couldn’t look forward to anymore. But he resumed practicing his saber forms, and he tried to meditate, although meditating had been hard enough when he had Obi-Wan to do it with.

Rex and Leia were the ones who made it easiest - Rex because he understood, was keeping an obnoxious eye on Cody and was always there at the rare times Cody wanted to talk; Leia because for all that she was seventeen and unpredictable and, frankly, a terror, had a Jedi’s uncanny emotional intuition and was more worried about Cody than she ought to have been. Both of them were stubbornly caring and didn’t leave Cody to his own devices, and that helped.

It wasn’t enough, quite, to make the Force stop feeling empty. But it was enough to get Cody out of his bed every day, enough to make him stay involved with missions and strategies and plans.

He kept moving, somehow, although any time Cody remembered that he was working, fighting, pushing towards nothing, towards a future that he’d only ever thought of in terms of his Jedi and his brothers (all gone, now), everything in him would want to  _ stop. _ To be anywhere else.

But he didn’t stop. Call it stubbornness or fatalism or necessity or force of habit or, if you were being generous, altruism, but whatever the motivation, he kept serving the Rebellion. Helped plan their attempts to liberate Lothal, worked with Rex on movements of supplies and forces.

Once, Ezra told him that Obi-Wan wasn’t dead. If the kid wasn’t likeable, didn’t so clearly mean well, Cody would’ve tossed him out of the nearest airlock and said good riddance. Kid gets a couple tastes of Jedi bullshit and thinks he knows everything, but whatever had happened in that Jedi Temple on Lothal (no one had been too clear on that point), that wouldn’t change the fact that Obi-Wan was dead. Even Jedi didn’t get resurrections.

“I saved him,” Ezra said. “There was this- portal, and I reached through and I pulled him out. He said he missed you, and he wanted to come home.”

Cody snorted, although gods, the story made anger simmer in his chest. Ezra thought he was right, that was all, but it was cruel to even try to give Cody hope over something that was so clearly impossible. “Enough, Ezra. Give it a rest. I’m no expert on the Force but even I know you can’t just raise the dead.” Excluding Sith techniques, anyway - there was no saving someone who was already dead.

Ezra told him that Obi-Wan had had one other thing to say. Ezra’s pronunciation was mangled, but nonetheless Cody recognized the Mando’a phrase that meant  _ I love you. _ Ezra was staring at him with wide blue eyes that said he really believed Obi-Wan wasn’t dead.

Cody told him to get the hells out. It wasn’t very kind, and it wasn’t fair. But Cody couldn’t take all this wet-behind-the-ears optimism, couldn’t listen to anymore imaginary messages from his dead husband.

Ezra didn’t bring the matter up again, and of course Obi-Wan didn’t come back. That was no surprise, yet it somehow managed to be disappointing. Cody had never considered himself a hopeful person, but there had always been something about kids like Ezra that inspired more optimism than was warranted - they were so sure of themselves. So despite the fact that Cody  _ knew _ there was no getting Obi back, it still hurt all over again when time went by and nothing changed and there was no sign of Obi-Wan.

Cody moved into a new room because the old one just felt a bit haunted. He didn’t keep any plants - he’d never been good at tending them anyway. He forced himself not to keep the spare sets of robes or Obi-Wan’s other clothes. He did keep Obi-Wan’s favorite book and favorite sweater, which he left together in his closet. The new room was no different from the old one, but it felt like moving on, so he could pretend he was figuring any of this out.

They recaptured Lothal. It was good, really - Cody felt, if not happy, pleased with his situation for the first time in a while. He had had some part in restoring the freedom of Ezra’s planet, and that was good.

He found he missed Kanan, despite not knowing him well. But Cody no longer dwelt on losses like that, even if that made him callous. So he said a remembrance and gave Hera and the others their space. Rex and Ahsoka were happy, and Cody joined them for the city-wide celebration after they freed Lothal. He enjoyed himself, had some drinks, tried to keep Wolffe from being lost because once again, their  _ vod  _ was dead and Wolffe, like Cody, had so little left. But the Force didn’t feel empty, for once - it was Light and warm, enough to ease all the cracked pieces that Cody only held together with sheer willpower, these days.

They all ended up at a restaurant for dinner, him and Rex and Ahsoka and what was left of the Ghost crew and Wolffe. Cody didn’t pay much attention to conversation, just ate his food and tried to enjoy the feeling of the Force. After a while, though, he got up and went to the bar to get a drink, wanting some space from the others, some time to think. He ordered a pint, dropped a credit stick on the counter, and took the foaming glass that was offered him with a short sigh, ignoring the other people around him at the bar.

“You seem to be getting careless, Cody.”

Wry, fond, teasing, the voice was unmistakable, one that haunted most of Cody’s nightmares and best dreams in equal measure. Cody set his drink down on the counter with a thunk and turned to look at the man who’d just seated himself to Cody’s right, barely more than a whisper of a presence in the Force, so that Cody had not felt him.

Obi-Wan was smiling, slightly, a familiar quirk of the lips, warm lines at the edges of his blue eyes, and aside from a little more grey in his beard, he looked the same as he had two years ago, when he’d  _ died. _

Cody stared at him for a moment, and then, in a perfectly reasonable burst of anger, knocked back a swallow of ale and snarled, “You absolute  _ bastard.” _

Obi-Wan’s lips twitched a little. “I’ve missed you too.”

“You utter-” Cody swore, furiously enough it earned him a raised eyebrow from Obi, and then he set down his ale and shoved himself off his stool and grabbed Obi-Wan into a hug, dragging his Jedi off his own seat and against his chest where he could feel he was really here. Obi-Wan put his arms around Cody, too, and Cody made a little noise, half anger, half pain.

“You  _ left,”  _ he said, small, remembering how easily he could rest his chin on Obi’s head, how Obi-Wan always fit just like this so easily and held on so tight. “Damn you, how could you let me-”

“I wasn’t able to come back,” Obi-Wan answered his accusation before he could finish it. “Not until I knew enough time had passed for Ezra to have saved me - this is the soonest I could be here.”

“Well, took you too damn long,” Cody rasped, slipping one hand up to card his fingers through Obi-Wan’s hair, which was longer than it used to be but just as soft. “Gods,  _ ner’jetii…” _

"I'm sorry," Obi said, gentle, tightening his arms around Cody. "I'm sorry, but I'm here now."

He was here now and Cody's whole world felt eased back onto a steady axis. He had his Obi-Wan and he'd be damned if he lost him again. Cody pulled back, traced his hand along Obi-Wan's jaw, met his eyes and just saw worry and love and even a few tears, so he leaned down and pressed his lips to Obi's, soft and hungry, to relearn what Obi-Wan felt like.

"I love you," Obi murmured, when he had leaned away again, and Cody smiled and shoved back what was left of the darkness and emptiness in the Force.

"I love you too, my dearest Obi-Wan," he said. "And I'm going to  _ kill _ you, what were you thinking, sending me back promises when you were kriffing dead?" That had been meant to sound like a joke. Somehow it didn't, just came out forced and choked.

"Oh, Cody." Obi reached up and softly soothed his hand over Cody's cheek, and Cody worked to relearn that feeling, too, the familiar gentleness of Obi-Wan's callused fingers. "I wanted you to remember, when I was gone, that it didn't mean I was leaving you."

"Well, you were gone, what else are you gonna call it?" Cody asked, voice cracking a little, and Obi-Wan just swiped his thumb under Cody's eye to catch the few stray tears that Cody couldn't stop. "How could you-" Cody stopped, because all he really wanted to say was  _ how could you leave me, _ but he was no child anymore, and he shouldn't be feeling like this when Obi-Wan was home now, when it hadn't been Obi-Wan's fault.

"It's alright, Cody." Obi slipped his hand from Cody's cheek to the back of his head, eased him down so Cody could press his forehead to Obi-Wan's. Obi-Wan stroked his hair a little, gently. "I'm so sorry, love, I didn't want to go."

_ "Ner'karta,"  _ Cody rasped, letting go of Obi-Wan and taking hold of his hands so he could step back and straighten up.  _ My heart.  _ "Don't do that to me again."

"I promise."

Cody smiled, for the first time in a long time, and squeezed Obi's hands. "Alright, that's good enough for me."


End file.
